2026-03-18 - CD Paris - VEOLIA PROPRETE v. Tiru - UPC_CFI_417/2025
- Aktenzeichen:
- UPC_CFI_417/2025
- Datum:
- Spruchkörper:
- Court of First Instance - Paris (FR) Central Division - Seat
- Art:
- Decision
- Parteien:
- VEOLIA PROPRETE v. TIRU
Kernaussage: The Paris Central Division maintained an incinerator patent in amended form and set out, in four headnotes, how Article 123(3) EPC and the rectification of obvious errors work at the UPC.
2026-03-18 - CD Paris - VEOLIA PROPRETE
v.
Tiru - UPC_CFI_417/2025
notable
The Paris Central Division maintained an incinerator patent in amended form and set out, in four headnotes, how Article 123(3) EPC and the rectification of obvious errors work at the UPC. Article 123(3) EPC protects the legal certainty of third parties by forbidding any extension of the protection conferred after grant, regardless of whether the extension would follow directly and unambiguously from the application as filed; protection may be extended in some respects while restricted in others, and it suffices to identify a single embodiment covered by the amended patent but not by the granted patent for the extension to be unlawful. On that test the main request and three auxiliary requests failed, because a scenario in which cooling air enters the cell without passing through the outward and return channels fell outside the granted claim and inside the amended one. The Court also held that an obvious material error in a granted claim may be corrected in the course of an amendment, and that an obvious material error in a party's own filed document may be corrected by that party at the first opportunity without the correction counting as a late new ground. Where description and claim contradict each other and the skilled person would see the contradiction without difficulty, the claim prevails, being the starting point and the decisive basis of any interpretation. The alleged prior public use failed for want of proof of accessibility, and the inventive-step attacks were rejected as retrospective reasoning.
Nichtigkeitsgründe
Art. 138 EPCNovelty
Patent survived (this ground)Art. 54 EPC · Art. 138(1)(a) EPC
“The novelty attacks failed. In particular the alleged prior public use of the 'Four Laurent Bouillet 1987' was rejected: no proof that the plans and manual were made available to the public before the priority date of 9 December 2015, and controlled site visits and maintenance operations did not show that anyone free of a confidentiality obligation had access to the internal structural features that matter [147]-[150]. Novelty of claims 1 and 13 of auxiliary request 2.0 was not contested [151].”
Inventive Step
Patent survived (this ground)Art. 56 EPC · Art. 138(1)(a) EPC
“Inventive step was upheld over Grannec alone and in combination with Heliox, Vanderpol and LBI, and over CH'286. The combination arguments were held to be retrospective reasoning: none of the secondary documents teaches injecting cooling air into the cell to cool the combustion products, and obviousness must be assessed with the objective technical problem in mind [183]-[199].”
Added Matter
Partially invalid (this ground)Art. 123(2) EPC · Art. 138(1)(c) EPC
“The Art. 123(3) EPC objection succeeded against the main request and auxiliary requests 1.1, 1.3 and 1.6, which extended the protection conferred by covering a configuration the granted claim did not [91]-[97], [105]. It failed against auxiliary request 2.0, whose claim 1 was not broadened and whose renumbered claim 13 was held compliant [122]-[125]. Objections under Art. 123(2) EPC and Art. 84 EPC were also raised against the amended claims.”
Inoffiziell
Inoffizielle KI-Übersetzung
Dies ist eine automatische, von KI erstellte Übersetzung, die Fehler enthalten kann. Rechtsverbindlich ist allein das Originaldokument in der Verfahrenssprache (French).